ITFN 3601/CSCI 3305

OPERATING SYSTEMS
COMPUTER HARDWARE REVIEW
OS CONCEPTS OVERVIEW
AGENDA

 OS Introduction
 Flavors of OS
 Hardware Review
 OS Concepts Overview
 System Calls
 Various OS Approaches
WHAT IS AN OS?

 And ya’ can’t say “Operating System”

OS DEFINED

 Abstract Interface
 Service provider for hardware
 Abstracts the details of the machine
 Provides an API (system calls) to user
 Resource Manager
 Multiple users, multiple resources
 Orderly, controlled allocation of resources
 Fairness, protection, space-time, etc.
HISTORY OF OPERATING SYSTEMS

 Machine-centric  Human-centric

 Vacuum Tubes (1945-1955)

 All programming done in machine language
 No OS
 Usage done by the same people who
built the machine

Obtained from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA-3.0

HISTORY OF OS (CONT.)

 Transistors & Batch (1955-1965)

 University, government, & big-business
 Mainframes & operators in dedicated rooms
 Punch cards
 Deck readers
 Input/Output bins
 Batch processing onto tape
HISTORY OF OS (CONT.)

 Integrated Circuits (1965-1980)

 Software-compatible product lines
 Birth of the modern notion of the OS
 Multi-purpose machine w/ software (OS) intermediary
 Multiprogramming (multiple programs/jobs sharing resources)
 UNIX
HISTORY OF OS (CONT.)

 Personal Computing (1980-present)

 LSI chips
 Cheap memory, disk space, processing, etc.
 DOS, Windows, Mac OS, X
 Distributed computing
 PDA/embedded-devices